Movie Reviews
Film and television reviewed the way I’d want to read them — with a rating that means something, an honest accounting of what works and what doesn’t, and craft notes for writers who want to understand how the machinery operates.
Each review includes a craft notes section for writers — specific observations about structure, character, world-building, and what the film does that you can actually use. Not theory. Technique you can steal.
Film Noir (20)
May 19, 2026Body Heat (1981)
Lawrence Kasdan's 1981 directorial debut. William Hurt, Kathleen Turner. Double Indemnity through 1980s Florida humidity. Murder plot.
May 19, 2026Brick (2005)
Rian Johnson's 2005 high school neo-noir debut. Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Dashiell Hammett character among teenagers. Singular voice.
May 17, 2026Chinatown (1974)
Polanski's 1974 Los Angeles neo-noir. Nicholson, Dunaway, Huston. Robert Towne screenplay. The water-rights conspiracy that defined New Hollywood pessimism.
May 17, 2026Double Indemnity (1944)
Wilder's 1944 insurance-fraud noir. MacMurray, Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson. Chandler co-wrote with Wilder. The template every later noir borrowed from.
May 19, 2026Kiss Me Deadly (1955)
Robert Aldrich's 1955 apocalyptic noir. Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer. The great whatsit. Foundation for Pulp Fiction's briefcase.
May 16, 2026L.A. Confidential (1997)
Curtis Hanson's 1997 neo-noir on 1950s LAPD corruption. Three lead cops with actual arcs. The rare adult crime film that respects its audience.
May 19, 2026Out of the Past (1947)
Jacques Tourneur's 1947 fatalist noir. Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas. Past catches up template. Acapulco and California.
May 19, 2026Rififi (1955)
Jules Dassin's 1955 French heist. Thirty-two-minute silent jewelry heist sequence. Template for every heist procedural since.
May 19, 2026Sin City (2005)
Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller's 2005 hyper-stylized noir. Mickey Rourke, Bruce Willis, Clive Owen. Black-white with red accents.
May 17, 2026Sunset Boulevard (1950)
Wilder's 1950 Hollywood gothic. Holden as a screenwriter, Swanson as the silent star who refuses to fade. Narrated by a corpse from a swimming pool.
May 19, 2026The Asphalt Jungle (1950)
John Huston's 1950 jewel heist noir. Sterling Hayden, Sam Jaffe, brief Marilyn Monroe. The original ensemble heist film.
May 19, 2026The Big Sleep (1946)
Howard Hawks' 1946 Chandler adaptation. Bogart and Bacall. Plot incomprehensible even to the screenwriters. Doesn't matter.
May 19, 2026The Killers (1946)
Robert Siodmak's 1946 Hemingway adaptation. Burt Lancaster debut. Ava Gardner. The murder happens in the first ten minutes.
May 19, 2026The Killing (1956)
Kubrick's 1956 racetrack robbery. Sterling Hayden. Non-linear structure that became Tarantino's vocabulary. Lionel White novel.
May 19, 2026The Long Goodbye (1973)
Robert Altman's 1973 Chandler revisionism. Elliott Gould as Marlowe out of place in 1970s LA. Cat opening. Hooray for Hollywood.
May 17, 2026The Maltese Falcon (1941)
Huston's 1941 directorial debut. Bogart as Sam Spade. The film that established American film noir as a coherent style.
May 19, 2026The Third Man (1949)
Carol Reed's 1949 post-war Vienna thriller. Joseph Cotten investigates Orson Welles. Zither score. The sewer chase is canonical.
May 19, 2026Touch of Evil (1958)
Orson Welles' 1958 border noir. Three-minute opening tracking shot. Welles as corrupt cop. The genre's late masterpiece.
May 16, 2026Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950)
Otto Preminger's 1950 film noir with Dana Andrews. Detective accidentally kills suspect then frames innocent man. Among the great noir achievements.
May 19, 2026White Heat (1949)
Raoul Walsh's 1949 noir gangster. Cagney as psychopathic mama's boy Cody Jarrett. Made it Ma, top of the world. Genre climax.